red into digging away at it by the thought of the money
lying in her name in the bank, which she had received for giving the
clew leading to little Raymond Bartlett's discovery the summer before,
and which would pay her way to college for one year at least.

The theorem was learned at last so that she could make a recitation on
it, even if she did not understand it perfectly, and Migwan left it to
take up a piece of work which gave her as much pleasure as the other did
pain. This was the writing of a story which she intended to send away to
a magazine. She wrote it in the back of an old notebook, and when she
was not working at it she kept it carefully in the bottom of her
shirtwaist box, where the prying eyes of her younger sister would not
find it. She had all the golden dreams and aspirations of a young
authoress writing her first story, and her days were filled with a
secret delight when she thought of the riches that would soon be hers
when the story was accepted, as it of course would be. If she had known
then of the long years of cruel disillusionment that would drag their
weary length along until her efforts were finally crowned with success
it is doubtful whether she would have stayed in out of the October
sunshine so cheerfully and worked with such enthusiasm.

Migwan's family could have used to advantage all the gold which she was
dreaming of earning. After her father died her mother's income, from
various sources, amounted to only about seventy-five dollars a month,
which is not a great amount when there are three children to keep in
school, and it was a struggle all the way around to make both ends meet.
Mrs. Gardiner was a poor manager and kept no accounts, and so took no
notice of the small leaks that drained her purse from month to month.
She was fond of reading, as Migwan was, and sat up until midnight every
night burning gas. Then the next morning she would be too tired to get
up in time to get the children off to school, and they would depart with
a hasty bite, according to their own fancy, or without any breakfast at
all, if they were late. She bought ready-made clothes when she could
have made them herself at half the cost, and generally chose light
colors which soiled quickly. She never went to the store herself,
depending on Tom or scatter-brained Betty, her younger daughter, to do
her marketing, and in consequence paid the highest prices for
inferior-grade goods.

Thus the seventy-five dollars